Secretary Bo Xilai, then-secretary of the Communist Party in Chongqing, attends the opening session of the National People's Congress in Beijing in March 2012. / Ng Han Guan, AP

by Calum MacLeod, USA TODAY

by Calum MacLeod, USA TODAY

BEIJING - His wife admitted to the fatal poisoning of a British businessman. His police chief is jailed. Now, Bo Xilai, a once-high-flying politician here, faces his own day in court.

His trial on charges of bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power starts Thursday.

Held in the eastern Chinese city of Jinan, far from Bo's last power base in southwestern Chongqing, the trial is likely to be quick, and a guilty verdict likely since the ruling Communist Party controls China's courts. Often, the party's leaders call the shots in such sensitive cases.

Bo's stellar career started unraveling last February when his police chief, Wang Lijun, sought asylum at the U.S. Consulate in nearby Chengdu. A coverup involving Wang and Bo failed to contain the news that Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, had poisoned a British businessman, Neil Heywood, in Chongqing after a business dispute.

She later admitted to a "mental breakdown" for her actions that resulted in her pouring cyanide down Heywood's throat after he got sick from drinking with her in a hotel, state news reported.

Despite the trappings of legal procedure, "Bo's case is more about politics than law," said Zhang Ming, a political scientist at People's University in Beijing.

"The Politburo standing committee has already decided Bo's crimes; the trial is only a show," he said. "Bo was defeated entirely due to political reasons. He lost a fight for position between power groups."

A member of the party's 25-person Politburo, and the party boss of Chongqing, a sprawling city-province of 30 million people, Bo appeared to be campaigning for a seat on the Politburo's standing committee, the very apex of power in China, at a leadership transition last fall.

Far more charismatic than most Chinese politicians, Bo, 64, won popular support for his tough tactics on battling organized crime, and his revival of Maoist-era "red songs." But his unorthodox ways apparently unsettled power brokers and rivals within the party.

Bo and Gu's son, studying in the USA, told The New York Times on Monday he has been denied contact with both parents since they were detained in March 2012.

Despite official censorship, the scandal offered Chinese citizens a rare glimpse into the usually highly secretive world of their nation's power elite, and exposed infighting in a party that strives to project harmony and uniformity.

"I don't have much interest in this trial, but I want to see on TV what Bo Xilai looks like after such a long time in prison," said Huang Kaifu, 35, a clerk in a Beijing IT company. Sources told Reuters in February that the normally dapper Bo had staged hunger strikes and refused to shave to protest against his treatment.

If Bo cooperates, he is likely to avoid the death penalty, which is often applied in major corruption cases in China, as the party rarely executes its senior figures. Bo may be jailed for 15 or more years, predicted Li Zhuang, a lawyer who was jailed in Chongqing after defending a businessmen accused of mafia operations.

Li doubted such a sentence would satisfy many of Bo's victims in Chongqing, where Bo ignored the rule of law to imprison thousands of people and seize large amounts of money.

The bribery and embezzlement charges are linked to Bo's earlier positions in northeastern China, and only the abuse of power charge is related to his most recent job.

Bo committed a crime by covering up the murder by his wife, said Li, who is disappointed by the choice of trial venue, predictably far from Bo's network of influence.

"Bo deceived many good and honest people in Chongqing who still think Bo was a good man. If the trial was held in Chongqing, it would help them see clearly his real criminal face and his evil," he said.

Beijing is now using the case to highlight leader Xi Jinping's crackdown on corruption, although Bo's downfall predates Xi's ascent to the top.

"To a large degree, the party wants to use the Bo trial to demonstrate its strong commitment to anti-corruption," said Zhu Jiangnan, a Chinese politics expert at Hong Kong University. "It attempts to deter both corruption and disobedience to the central government."

The fact that even Bo, a political star with impeccable party credentials, is up for trial, "alerts many cadres that once the party goes after them for corruption, no one can effectively protect them," she said.

Since Xi took over, he has vowed to fight both "tigers" and "flies" - corrupt officials big and small, Zhu said. The Bo trial tackles a tiger and signals Party resolve to win public endorsement by fighting corruption, she said. Yet many Chinese remain doubtful the case signals real change.

"Chinese leaders are so secretive, we know nothing about their assets and their children until they were jailed," said Huang, the IT worker. "I'm not surprised about Bo, after one case after another," he said. "It's a pity that although everybody in China complains about corruption, many people still want their children to become officials, because they can benefit from the job."